Meraki MX for multi-site retail: the 2026 line-up reviewed

On 27 August 2026 Meraki announced end of sale for the MX67C and MX68CW, the small-branch appliances with built-in LTE, effective 27 November 2026, with support continuing to 30 November 2031. The MX84 reaches end of support on 31 October 2026 and the MX100 on 1 February 2027. For retail chains that standardised on these models, the question is no longer whether to refresh but which of the current options to choose.

Two hardware lines, one dashboard

The MX family datasheet, updated on 1 September 2026, now lists two kinds of hardware. The classic MX appliances run from the MX67 and MX68, rated for small branches of up to 50 devices with 700 Mbps of firewall throughput, through the MX75 and MX85 for up to 200 and 250 devices at 1 Gbps, to the MX95 and MX105. Alongside them are Cisco 8000 Series Secure Routers with the -MX suffix: the C8111-G2-MX and C8121-G2-MX for small branches of up to 200 devices with 2 Gbps of firewall and 1 Gbps of advanced security throughput, 2.5 Gbps WAN ports and integrated 5G on some variants, and the C8355-G2-MX and C8455-G2-MX for large sites and VPN concentrators.

Meraki's FAQ explains that the 8000 models run MX OS on the same hardware as their IOS XE counterparts, sit in the same dashboard organisation as classic MX and support the same security features. Cisco states that they are not replacements and that it continues to invest in the MX platforms. There are practical differences, though: the operating system cannot be converted between MX OS and IOS XE during the product's life, existing MX licences cannot be transferred to the new routers, and some dashboard analytics such as Meraki Insights are not yet supported. From firmware MX 26.1 the 8000 models support up to four WAN uplinks.

For a retail estate, the strengths of the platform are unchanged: zero-touch deployment, AutoVPN between stores and head office, warm-spare high availability and central policy for many small sites. Licensing is per device in three tiers: Enterprise, Advanced Security and Secure SD-WAN Plus. IPS, malware protection and content filtering need Advanced Security, which matters for stores that process card payments over the same link.

What it means for buyers

Size each store by device count and advanced security throughput rather than by headline firewall figures, since the two differ by up to half on the smaller models. For stores that relied on the MX67C or MX68CW for LTE backup, compare the C8111-G2-MX and C8121-G2-MX cellular variants with a classic MX plus separate cellular gateway. Budget new licences for any move to 8000 hardware, order SFP optics separately where needed, and note that a warm-spare pair needs only one licence. InTechnologies can quote Meraki MX and Cisco 8000 MX models with the matching licence terms.